Real life
The rope riders came down the driveway slowly, their horses veering this way and that, side to side, forwards a…
Blasts from the past
One of the unforeseen consequences of the rise of streaming was a change in the very structure of the pop…
Mercurio rising
When a drama begins with news of a ‘Chis handler’ receiving ‘intel graded A1 on the matrix’ that causes a…
Vibrant
‘Think yourself lucky,’ said my husband when I told him about poor John Stuart Mill’s mother, who had nine children…
Haute cuisine for the homeless
A year of lockdowns has certainly passed slowly. But there are topics for thought. One disappointment has been the Church…
Friends in need
During the referendum campaign five years ago, the pro-Brexit side argued that by freeing ourselves from the EU’s native protectionism…
Portrait of the Week
Home The nation was surprised to learn that from 29 March there would be a dearth of vaccine for a…
Diary
Spring Cannot Be Cancelled arrives on the doorstep. It is a gloriously illustrated book by Martin Gayford about his conversations…
Roman culture wars
Identity politics empowers people to make all sorts of claims, not because they are true but because it makes them…
to 2496: Depart Paddington
The play was The Winter’s Tale by Shakespeare. The perimetric dramatis personae are MAMILLIUS, LEONTES, FLORIZEL, DORCAS, MOPSA, HERMIONE and…
High life
Gstaad I have never experienced such a long, continuous blizzard, and I’ve been coming here for 63 years. The ski…
2499: Entitled trio
The unclued lights, including three proper nouns (two of two words), consist of three groups of three words of a…
Terrifying divas and lesbian separatists
The promise of the internet was supposed to be thus: you could be your own bizarre, inappropriate self, and you…
Cancel culture
In Competition No. 3191 you were invited to submit a Shakespearean soliloquy reflecting on the news that the Bard has…
Cross purposes
Two millennia ago, in the outer reaches of the empire, the Romans performed a routine execution of a Galilean rebel.…
Puzzle no. 646
Black to play… and lose! Aronian–Van Foreest, March 2021. Van Foreest’s next move didn’t blunder his queen but was nonetheless…
Bridge
The Young Chelsea Knock Out is a terrific tournament, and the best thing about it is that the winners get…
Everybody must get stoned
Have you ever played the Frankenstein-Dracula variation? The Monkey’s Bum? The Nescafé Frappé Attack? These are all real chess openings,…
Weighty matters
This is a novel about ‘mommy issues’. Rachel is a Reform Jew, ‘more Chanel bag Jew than Torah Jew’, and…
Escape from reality
Ewan Morrison is an intellectually nimble writer with a penchant for provocation. His work has included the novels, Distance, Ménage…
Frolics and fossils
Ammonite is writer-director Francis Lee’s second film after God’s Own Country, one of the best films of 2017, and possibly…
Holiday retreats
It was the 13th-century wall of a ruined Cistercian nunnery at the far end of her garden in Norfolk that…
Wilde at heart
BKLYN — The Musical gives itself a headache for no reason. What does ‘BKLYN’ mean? Perhaps it’s a random jumble…
The power of the Oxford brand
I am writing with a mild pain in one arm, having received my first dose of the Oxford vaccine yesterday…
